From ZENcast.com: “Podcasts, named after our biggest competitor who’s been kicking our asses into next Thursday, short for Personal On Demand broadCast, are audio files you can download into any MP3 player or computer. These audio files are broadcasted over the Internet automatically to subscribers of specific podcast channels.”

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I was just checking out my Google Analytics stats for the first time and noticed a bunch of referrals back in November from a site with no domain name, just an IP address. Found out someone’s running a BBS there for train gropers to swap stories. A user had linked to the episode where I talked about my wife being groped. 100’s of men there from every corner of the globe, who should be lined up to have their heads used for batting practice. Not at all surprising, but it seems that to them Japan is an ass-grabbing paradise. When you read their posts, it’s obvious it’s not a one-time thing for them, and they won’t stop on their own.

I have no idea WTF a WMF file is, but the basic gist is your Windows PC can get very severely hacked simply by visiting a website or opening an e-mail containing a trojaned image file. The exploit was discovered in the wild on Dec 27 but I wasn’t keeping up with geek news over the holidays.

Technical explanation here. A third party patch, unsupported by Microsoft but blessed by security experts, available here. Expert advice is to use the patch until MS releases an official version scheduled to be available on Jan 10. The makeshift patch uninstalls easily.

You might want to practice safe sex on the net for the time being. Porn sites are notorious for spreading computer viruses. Also, there’s a rumor it’s spreading via MSN too. Banner ads from a malware-for-profit company called Exfol are reported to be infected.

It would be a very good idea to make sure your anti-virus software is up to date. If you’re surfing commando or stopped paying for virus definition updates long ago, AVG Anti-Virus is free and trustworthy.

Here are some Flickr tags for the three kinds of new year’s decorations you see in Japan.

shime-kazari
kagami-mochi
kado-matsu

Not usually spelled with hyphens, but it makes the words easier to read.

And here’s the traditional food for new years: o-sechi. O-sechi consists of many different foods, some eaten throughout the year, some not. To me, it’s all good, but I’ll put anything in my mouth as long as somebody somewhere calls it food.

While looking for photos of new years decorations I came across this user. Her photos are beautiful. Hard to believe she only started taking pictures in 2004.